Easter 2009

We all had a very blessed Easter 2009. We started our day celebrating Mass and the Resurrection of our Lord and then spent time at Grandma's and also at Papa's with both sides of the family. This combination is always a guaranteed good time. The kids of course made a haul in both places.

Christmas Morning at Home

Celebrating New Years!

Celebrating New Years with my family has been one of my favorite family traditions. When I was about 16 years old, my Mother and Father started the tradition of taking the entire family, with dates out for a nice dinner. We then would go back to their house and celebrate in the New Year. They started this so that they could have us safe with them and not on the streets with all the drunks. We have been doing this ever since.

My Father and Brother

While we are almost always all together, there have been a few times that someone is out of town. This year my two oldest nieces, one who just got engaged and one who had to go back to Indiana to work, were not with us. Also my youngest sister and her husband received tickets to a Neil Diamond concert as a gift. Neil is one of my brother in laws favorite so they couldn't pass up the show. But their daughters came and they met up with us as soon as the concert was over.

My oldest brother and his wife.

We went to one of my brothers favorite steak houses. It was nice because we almost had a room to ourselves. We had plenty of room and the restaurant was compatible with having conversations with each other. It was a great dining experience.

My single brother, and niece and nephew.

The waitress was pretty good for our large party and took good care of all of our requests. They were also very good to the little ones in the group. They brought their food first and kept them happy with their Shirley Temples and orange juice.

Dinga and Dingo, alias my older sister and her husband.

The adults got to share a great bottle of red and white wine. It was funny seeing my nephew, who turned 21 on October 15th, drinking with us! It is always amazing to realize how old we are all getting.

My brother who is a year older than me and his wife.

When dinner was done we enjoyed some really good desert. The cheesecake and the brownie mud pie ala mode were all so good. We were all very full and satisfied when we left about three hours later! We had a great relaxing time celebrating the end of 2008.

My husband and I!

I had fun playing with my camera at dinner. I don't know if everyone else had as much fun with it as I did! My sister took this picture of me and my husband. It is one of only a very few of myself this Christmas. When you have the camera, you don't end up in very many pictures! I of course like this.

The Grasshopper and her husband, alias my youngest sister.

My niece, two nephews and my other niece.

My nephew sporting his new haircut.

The youngest cousins posing outside on the bench before dinner.

My sister and her husband made it to my Dad's almost the same time that we made it home from dinner. We only had about an hour to wait for the year to end. We got out the champagne and apple cider for all to toast and waited for the year to end. We did the countdown at midnight and then toasted in the new year!

At midnight the kids went out and lit sparklers. This is one of their favorite things!

We had a great 2008, with its sorrows and joys. I pray that the Lord will bless us with a great 2009. We are looking forward to new additions this year with a wedding and hopefully maybe even a baptism!

Christmas Time

We had a very Merry Christmas this year, even a visit from Old Saint Nick! Here he is instructing us on the difference from "aside the nose" and "inside the nose!" Gotta love those replacement clauses.

The kids got tired of posing for pictures. I got a new lens for Christmas and I took over 500 pictures from Christmas Eve until Christmas Day! Thank goodness for digital.

My children got everything they wanted and more. I can't believe how everyone is so good to them.

My daughter looks so cute, she doesn't need that makeup she is putting on. Makeup is one of her favorite things to play with, thanks to her godmother who gave her some last year.

We have had a very blessed Christmas time! It has been very busy with work, family and colds! I hope to get back to my regular blogging after new years! Happy New Years to All!

Christmas Home Tour

Welcome, welcome! I am so glad that I finally am able to host all of you! I have been so excited about this day, that I took too much time taking pictures! But, we are here and I want you all to enjoy.

This is my home all aglow! My husband enjoys Christmas lights and loves decking it all out. He says it is for the children, but since we are all children at heart, it is for him as well!

This year we added a nativity set. This is my favorite outside decoration, after all this is truly the reason for the season!


And Santa is waiting by the front door to greet all of you as well!

He is also at your feet as soon as you open the front door. Be careful where you wipe your feet!

This is what you see when you open the door.

To the right is our living room. When we bought this house, the first thing we thought was a room for the Christmas tree! Our last house did not have a front window to put the tree in.

This is my collection of Santa pictures with my children. It is so much fun looking at how they have changed over the last six years!

The village has taken over the living room. We have a town, a North Pole and a country setting. These are a few of my favorite pieces.

The church, the school and the coffee house. I also like the kids sledding in the front.

The North Pole is next. It sits on top of our antique piano.

The kids around the campfire and the tent is a fun accessory to our country area.

This is the front room tree. It is more of a designer type tree. It has poinsettias, red and gold ornaments, angels and snowflakes on it.

The snowflakes are hand made by my husband's late grandmother. I love them! I have them on both of our trees. Just like real snowflakes, each one is a little different from the next.

These angels are from my mother. She gave them to me along time ago. There are about twenty of them and they are all different sizes. They are all very cute.

The Santa Express winds its way around this tree. This is one of the things the kids just love to put up. We got this when my son was a year old. I can still see the look on his face the very first time that we set it up! A great memory!

Grandma got this for my son that same year. It is an advent calendar. In each box their is an ornament to hang on the trees. For his second year, we put a Hershey kiss in each box as well as the ornament. He started asking if he could do the "Kisser Calendar." The name stuck and this is what they both call it now. I only wish it would have been a nativity scene.

We now enter my dining room. This is my buffet. I love the snowmen and the glow they add to the wood.

Our kitchen table. We added the hanging ornaments this year. We light our advent wreath during dinner. The kids love to take turns blowing out the candles. You can also see our window box that is decorated. We love to watch all the cars go through our neighborhood looking at the lights.

Next we go to our Family room. The first year we were here, we couldn't wait to put the Christmas tree in the Living room window. The only problem was that we didn't hang out there. We missed having a tree to enjoy, so we went and bought another one. Here are some of our favorite ornaments.

Mary and baby Jesus.

A beaded snowflake made by my husband's grandmother.

I don't know what happened to the rest of my pictures:( I will have to add another post showing the tree, my inside nativity and a few other things!

I hope you enjoyed it and will come back again! If you want to see more, check out Boomama.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

It is beginning to look a lot like Christmas at our house, and I love it! We love to turn all the Christmas lights on at night and no regular lights. It is beautiful and really helps get all of us in the mood for Christmas. Here is one of our trees on Friday evening. It wasn't decorated yet but we could still light it up!

My husband has the outside almost all done. He worked all weekend on it even though he was sick! All he has left to do is go buy more extension cords! It is amazing how many more we end up buying every year.

My daughter was a big help on the living room tree. We turned up the Christmas music and enjoyed putting on the ornaments. I didn't let it bother me that all her decorations were in one spot, I just moved them later without telling her. It was more important that we were making Christmas memories.

A Thanksgiving Feast

Thanksgiving came and went so fast this year. It seems like before I even realized it, I was planning the meal and going grocery shopping. I have been blessed to be the hostess for both my family and my husbands family for Thanksgiving the last several years. This year we were a smaller group with only 25 people. But like usual, we had plenty of food!

We had a smoked turkey, a barbecued turkey, a ham and lots and lots of side dishes. My favorite this year was Pioneer Woman's corn and wild rice. It was so good that I am going to make sure it is on the menu again.

After my sister got her plate she told me to get my camera. I am glad she did because her plate looked so pretty. I just love white plates, they make your food look so good!

This was suppose to be the drink table but some of the many desserts made it here. My mother in law makes the best punch and my sister in law again brought some outstanding wine! She also made the cupcakes. They were so pretty and tasted great too.

She did such a great job on them. She must be taking after her mother when it comes to baking. My mother in law always brings the desserts and she didn't disappoint this year. She made cookies, fudge, peanut butter balls, lemon meringue pie, two chocolate pies, two pumpkin pies, pumpkin cheese cake, peach cobbler and pumpkin roll! Can you say stuffed!

Before dinner the kids were out playing in the backyard. They even let me take a picture of them all together.

We were also fortunate to have our parish priest, Father Mike, come for dinner. I don't have the pull to get him to my house, but my sister does. She works at the parish office and she invited him for dinner. We were glad that he came.

I don't know what I would do with out Auntie D! She is my brother in law's sister and also my husband's 2nd cousin; confusing I know. But Auntie D always makes the turkey gravy and she makes it so good! It would not be Thanksgiving without her.

My husband's side drinking and chatting before dinner.

My mother in law making the punch.

I didn't get very many pictures because I was busy cooking. I hardly took any of my family. I hope my sister got better pictures and shares them.

I had a great time once all the food got on the table. There was a brief time when I was wondering what I was thinking when I set the time for dinner at noon. We didn't eat at noon, but since my sister made great appetizers, everyone patiently waited. Since all the food was so good, it was worth waiting for!